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Plymouth marathoners escape Boston bombing

BOSTON, MA - The tragedy of the bombings in Boston had a local link that thankfully had a happier ending for two Plymouth residents.

Paul Patrick and Jamie Holm were both runners in the Boston Marathon on Monday where bombs marred the ending of the annual event with three deaths and more than 100 hurt. Fortunately for them they had both finished the race well before the bombs exploded.

“The clock in the news reports read a race time of four hours ten minutes but that was actually the third wave of runners,” said Patrick.
“I finished at about three hours and 26 minutes and Jamie finished close to the same time as me. We were both about an hour and a half ahead of the bombing.”

Patrick and Holm had no idea what had occurred until arriving at their hotel.

“We were on the way back to our hotel when we got there and saw the news it was just unbelieveable,” said Patrick.

“What this race means to these people and this city and to have it now marred this way is just a terrible thing. The city of Boston is having a tough time dealing with it.”

The annual marathon is not only a “bucket list” race for runners, it is part of city wide Patriot Day festivities in the city celebrating the battle of Concord and Lexington that started the American Revolution.

“The race itself is unbelievable. The crowd support is just amazing. Every mile of that course is lined with people cheering on the runners. I’ve run in some smaller marathons but this one is just amazing.”

“One of the people killed was an eight year old boy that was there with his Mom and his sister waiting for his Dad to finish. You have to understand what it means to run for four hours and then be within sight of that finish line and be told you can’t finish and then realize why and that your family is in the middle of it. There can’t be anything much worse than that.”

“People couldn’t communicate with each other because you checked your baggage and obviously after the explosion nobody was allowed to get their bags right away. If you couldn’t find somebody with a cell phone or something you had no way of contacting family. I know Jamie and I spent about 3 hours after the race just contacting family and friends to let everybody know we were okay.”